Sen. John Edwards Kills Bills That Would Have Protected Children From Sex Trafficking, Gender Mutilation, Pornography

As reported here, the horrific ordeal of an Appomattox High School student, Sage, led to a bill known as “Sage’s Law” in this year’s General Assembly to help protect Virginia youth from the clutches of sex trafficking. If it had passed, the law would have required schools to notify parents if their minor children were seeking to change their gender, surgically mutilate their genitals, and/or engage in chemical castrations.

Staff at Appomattox High School tried to hide Sage’s gender dysphoria from her parents, and that set her on a path whereby she was sex trafficked first to Maryland. Then, when a judge there refused to let her return to her parents, she was placed in the boys’ wing of a children’s home where she was abused again and trafficked to Texas, where she was finally liberated by law enforcement and returned to her family in Virginia.

Despite the near-universal revulsion toward sex trafficking, especially against children, Sen. John Edwards (D-Roanoke) stunningly voted on February 16 to kill “Sage’s Law” in a state Senate Health and Education Committee.

In lockstep with his eight Democrat colleagues, Edwards voted to “pass by indefinitely” HB 2432, thus killing the proposed safeguard in this session of the General Assembly.  In contrast, three Republican Senators representing Central and Western Virginia all voted to keep the bill alive, but were outvoted 9-6. They are Senators David Suetterlein, Steve Newman, and Mark Peake.

Despite the high-profile, widespread support for parental rights, “Sage’s Law” was not the only child-protection, parental rights bill that Sen. Edwards and his Committee killed yesterday.

Likewise, in a party-line 9-6 vote, they also torpedoed HB 1379 which would have required schools to identify every item in a public school library that contains graphic sexual content, as defined in the bill’s text, to be flagged as such in an electronic catalog and to allow parents access to that directory.

Studies have shown enrollment in government schools has dropped in recent years, especially since the Covid lockdowns. Interviews and anecdotal data indicate many factors are driving this decline, but unhealthy, toxic environments in the schools are surely a large reason.

The Code of Virginia states “A parent has a fundamental [emphasis added] right to make decisions concerning the upbringing, education, and care of the parent’s child.” It is unclear how Senate Democrats can justify their recent votes that contradict the clearly-worded Code of Virginia.

The Roanoke Star has reached out to Sen. Edwards for a statement to explain his votes to our reading community, but no response has been received as of publication time. Newly-elected Roanoke City councilmember Luke Priddy (D) is Sen. Edwards’ Chief of Staff.

This session of the General Assembly will soon be finishing, which will lead to the next round of voting. This November all 40 members of the State Senate and 100 members of the House of Delegates will face re-election.

As outlined here in a story most other news outlets have ignored, Sen. Edwards has long represented the 21st District, an area grossly gerrymandered to include the Democrat strongholds of Roanoke City and the Virginia Tech area.

With recent redistricting, however, that seat with its gerrymandered lines will soon vanish and will be replaced by a new, more competitive 4th District to include Roanoke City, Salem, and parts of Roanoke and Montgomery Counties. The newly-drawn 4th District has placed two incumbents into the same field, where pro-abortion Edwards will face pro-life Sen. Suetterlein.

As outlined here, all five members of the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors are Republicans. In that more competitive district, it will remain to be seen how Sen. Edwards’ votes against child protections and parental rights will be received by Valley voters in November.

–Scott Dreyer